Industrial innovation as a driver!

A new book  from ISA, encourages both manufacturers and automation suppliers to better capitalize on fast-emerging innovations in industrial technology, such as process automation systems, to drive transformative improvements in manufacturing.

“The emerging frontier for industrial innovation points at exciting ways to revolutionize the business of manufacturing—better managing operating risks and costs, reducing consumption of raw materials and energy, creating more recession-proof revenue streams, and improving safety and security,” says Augustine Tibazarwa, the author of Driving Business Value in Industrial Innovation: Disciplined Agility for Manufacturing Automation and a noted expert in R&D management and industrial technology development. “Whether it’s digitizing the physical state of a world-scale plant in real time, manipulating digital models of that plant and its manufacturing process to optimize economic value, and then changing the state of the plant for economic benefit, the potential of today’s process automation systems is profound.”

Realizing the potential, Tibazarwa emphasizes, and delivering on expected ROI requires a greater commitment among leaders in manufacturing and the automation profession to unlock new ways of driving business value and adopting proven frameworks from other industry sectors achieving transformative innovation.

His book, he says, “uniquely connects the business perspectives of manufacturers to those of automation suppliers, and the innovation perspectives of automation executives to those of automation technologists. After reading it, automation executives should be equipped to expect more from their technologists, while automation technologists should be emboldened to point out missed business opportunities and demand deeper executive commitment and sponsorship.”

Tibazarwa says the book also segue ways to the Industrial Internet of Things (IIoT), identifying new business value opportunities for manufacturing automation.

“For manufacturers, there are business value opportunities in the extended supply chain. For automation professionals, the fundamental capabilities for successful industrial innovation are also foundational enablers for IIoT innovation,” he points out.

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International automation co-operation at London symposium!

Collaborating with the Institution of Engineering and Technology (IET), the International Society of Automation (ISA) highlighted the latest developments, technologies and trends in instrumentation, process measurement and control through expert-led technical sessions, paper presentations and training courses at its 60^th International Instrumentation Symposium in London (GB) last month.

One of the sessions at the joint symposium! (Pic: Rodney Jones, ISA)

Some of the brightest minds from industry and more than 15 countries—particularly from the aerospace, oil and gas, chemical, and manufacturing sectors—and academia attended the symposium, which provided an opportunity to share knowledge, successes and best practices as well as address both common and emerging challenges. As part of the event, leading companies demonstrated their newest solutions and services at a vendor exposition.

The content-rich technical program, which included the presentation of more than 30 technical papers, featured many hot-topic areas of interest, notably:

• Cybersecurity
• Optical thermal history coatings
• Thermographic phosphors
• Sensors and transducers: theory, design and testing
• Turbine engine measurements
• Process measurement
• Wireless and automated systems

Given increasing concerns among industrial and manufacturing leaders about the risks posed by cyberattack, the opening session and keynote address focused on industrial cybersecurity.

Several global experts in industrial automation and control systems security emphasized the critical need to improve cyber defenses of critical infrastructure and adopt the guidelines of the US Cybersecurity Framework unveiled by US President Obama earlier in the year.

In addition to leading the conference’s initial session on cybersecurity, Adam Sedgewick, Senior Information Technology Policy Advisor of the National Institute of Standards and Technology, delivered a keynote address on the subject, outlining the key provisions of the Cybersecurity Framework and explaining why owners and operators of critical infrastructure and industrial plants should implement them.

Sujeet Shenoi, F.P. Walter Professor of computer science and professor of chemical engineering at the University of Tulsa, in another keynote address on cybersecurity, urged industrial leaders to quickly shore up defenses of critical infrastructure assets because he said they are currently far too susceptible to attack.

The Automation Federation, ISA’s umbrella organization that has been working with the White House to educate industry and manufacturing leaders on the value of the Cybersecurity Framework, assisted ISA and IET in crafting  the cybersecurity portion of the conference program. IET is a member of the Automation Federation.

In addition to the technical sessions, the product exhibition, networking activities, and a reception and banquet, the symposium included three training courses. Two of the courses were ISA courses. They were: Introduction to the Management of Alarm Systems (IC39C) and Industrial Wireless Systems (IC85C). The other course, Introduction to Measurement Uncertainty: Methods and Applications, was based on a popular ISA textbook and desk reference: Measurement Uncertainty: Methods and Applications, Fourth Edition.